


some stupid noble reason

by youheldyourbreath



Category: Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: F/M, for spideychelle week, mj is a ravenclaw, ned is a hufflepuff, peter is a gryffindor, this is a harry potter au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-06-25
Packaged: 2020-05-14 07:36:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19268707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youheldyourbreath/pseuds/youheldyourbreath
Summary: It starts with a letter addressed to Mr. Peter Parker at 616 Queens Boulevard. The letter that arrives is of a curious sort. It is attended by a grey owl and, in the age of modern technology, appears to be handwritten in heavy, black ink. The seal on the back is maroon and imprinted with some Latin words the young boy of eleven can barely make out.When he cracks open the seal, after all the letter is indeed addressed to him, it is an invitation. Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft And Wizardry.Peter tosses it aside without another thought.





	some stupid noble reason

It starts with a letter addressed to Mr. Peter Parker at 616 Queens Boulevard. The letter that arrives is of a curious sort. It is attended by a grey owl and, in the age of modern technology, appears to be handwritten in heavy, black ink. The seal on the back is maroon and imprinted with some Latin words the young boy of eleven can barely make out.

When he cracks open the seal, after all the letter is indeed addressed to him, it is an invitation. Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft And Wizardry. 

Peter tosses it aside without another thought. 

* * *

Two days later, another letter arrives but this time it is carried by a man— no, a giant— and he seems flustered. His eyes skirt nervously around the neighborhood as Peter makes him wait in the front door to get his Aunt. May doesn’t like when he talks to strangers. 

“Sorry,” he widely blinks up at the giant, “What’s your name, again?”

“I’m Professor Banner.”

* * *

Professor Banner, it turns out, has come personally to appeal to the Parker family about Hogwarts. Muggle children are usually the only ones that get house calls when they receive their letters. And Peter is not a muggle. 

His mother was a witch. She would have explained everything to Peter when he got older, Professor Banner says, but she died when he was four in that car accident with his Dad and all of the truth about magic went with her. 

Ben and May sit in stunned disbelief. 

Peter blinks at the hulking, green figure in his living room. He has barely processed the news when he stutters, “I can’t. I can’t be a wizard.” 

“Has there ever been anything you could do, Peter, something you couldn’t explain?” A hundred little moments flash into his mind. Professor Banner draws a skinny, wooden stick out of his pocket. It looks carved and well-loved, which Peter thinks is odd for a tree branch. The green giant smiles, “Let me show you.”

Magic lights up the room.

* * *

His robes drown him. They hang limply off his arms as he is crowded in front of a dusty, old hat in the Great Hall with all of the other first years awaiting sorting. He loathes the attention all the older students pin on him and his classmates. 

Peter lowers his eyes to the ground. The boy next to him, the one that spoke a mile-a-minute the entire boat ride across the river, whispers, “Are you nervous?”

“Yes,” he admits. His Aunt May always told him to be honest about his feelings. There was no value in bottling them up, she said. He trusts Aunt May implicitly. 

The chattering boy uselessly flaps the arms of his robes. “Me too,” he agrees. 

“I’m Peter.”

“Ned,” he replies. 

They are quiet as the next student, last name Jones, climbs up to get sorted. The hat calls out Ravenclaw. There is some polite applause from the sea of blue across the hall. 

“Do you want to be my friend?” Ned asks.

Peter nods, “I do.” 

* * *

Peter likes his red tie. He likes his house, even though it is up and up and up a million steps to reach the tower. He likes his housemates and his classmates and he really likes his classes. 

The Professor he likes the most, though, is Auror Stark. His Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor knows things, Peter can just tell. He was part of a special operation, the Avengers Unit, for the Ministry of Magic during the uprising of Ultron. 

And when Flash Thompson sticks his grubby hand in the air during the first lesson and asks about super, secret Ministry missions, Auror Stark only says, “We were the Wizarding World’s last line of defense.” 

It is the coolest thing his eleven year old brain has ever heard. 

* * *

Peter realizes he is good at magic halfway through his second year.

He doesn't really notice, at first, that his aptitude is beyond his peers because Michelle Jones is _so much better_ than everyone. By a long shot. The fact that he has some talent for charm work and defensive spells goes mostly unnoticed when Michelle magics circles around him. 

But when Auror Stark starts them on some basic dueling their second year, bowing and disarming spells mostly, he absolutely outspells all of his classmates. Auror Stark is impressed. Peter can tell because he awkwardly pats him on the shoulder and says, "Don't get cocky, Parker." 

He flushes a bright red and pride swells in his chest. Ned beams at his best friend so widely that he can ignore how Flash, his most constant tormentor, glowers openly and jealous. 

In fact, he misses a lot of things in the classroom that day, especially the willowy Ravenclaw in the corner that cocks her head curiously, like she never truly noticed him before. 

* * *

Michelle notices him every day after that first lesson in Defense Against the Dark Arts, when Peter first grows into his magical prowess. And somehow they become good-natured rivals. They are neck-in-neck in most of their classes. 

The Ravenclaw is more thoughtful than Peter about every subject. She asks questions about the why and the how, where Peter is brute force. He can draw his wand and do whatever is asked of him. Michelle questions everything. 

All the other third years find her constant back and forth with professors tedious. Even Ned, who is disarmingly charming, moans about how she holds up lessons. 

Walking out of a too-long History of Magic class, he gripes, "Don't get me wrong, I think Michelle is brilliant, but I wish she wouldn't question everything. Class was twice as long today." 

Peter shrugs, "She isn't doing it to be annoying. Just because things were done a certain way for thousands of years doesn't mean it is the right way to do it." 

Michelle appears, like a ghoul, at his side. He nearly jumps out of his skin. She does not say anything. She squints. He gulps. 

Ned whispers, "Don't. Move." 

Michelle rolls her eyes and starts to stalk down the corridor. Over her shoulder, she comments, "You're very observant." His knees almost give out. 

* * *

By the middle of their fourth year, MJ has become a part of their weird little friend group. Ned is pleased as peaches to have friends beyond Peter. The Hufflepuff throws his arm around his shoulder and grins, "No offense, mate."

Peter doesn't mind. He likes having MJ around. She is the smartest person he knows, and she is more than just smart-- she is intentional. Being around her makes him better, he thinks. 

Their rivalry takes a back seat to their friendship in every place save the classroom. Peter is good at magic, Michelle thinks quicker on her feet. The rest of their class struggles to keep up with the match of wits that happens whenever the two of them are engaged in class. Some Professors hate it. Others, Banner and Stark, in particular, thrive off their competitive nature. 

All is well.

Until Liz Allen-Toomes asks Peter to Hogesmeade. 

The fighting between MJ and Peter in class, which has always been friendly, turns sour. 

When she lays him out in Charms the first time, he storms across the room, his eyebrows knitted furiously, and whispers harshly, "What was that for?" 

She holsters her wand and shrugs coldly, "What?" 

"That," he frowns. "Is something wrong?" 

Michelle sweeps her forgotten book up in her hands. "Nope." She leaves him standing stupidly in the doorway. 

Later, Liz combs back his hair, as he rests his head in her lap, and the fifth year says, "Well, Michelle is kind of cold, Peter. What did you expect?" 

His mouth turns down. "No," he disagrees, "She isn't. She's just quiet. She keeps to herself." 

"Okay," Liz says, but she doesn't sound like she agrees with him. He sighs. He knows how MJ comes across to those that don't know her well. She is a loner. She doesn't need the approval of others. All of that doesn't mean she isn't a good person, or that she doesn't care about her friends. She is amazing. Her smiles are earned. Just one from her warms his entire day. 

He loathes thinking he did something to upset her. He cannot begin to fathom what he did. 

Peter gently guides Liz down to his mouth for a kiss. 

* * *

After the first Charms' class, things remain tense between them. Peter grows increasingly more frustrated by her sudden change in demeanor. To make matters worse, Ned seems split between his two friends. When Peter asks what went wrong, Ned blanches and stutters, "Uh, I don't know what you mean." 

It is the first time he can recall Ned lying to him. 

Fine, he thinks, if his friends want to lie to him and keep secrets, they were welcome to it. 

He throws himself headfirst into his studies and takes on Auror Stark as a mentor. He wants to be an Auror, he tells the older man. Stark frowns. "It's dangerous," he explains. 

Peter straightens his spine, "I can handle it." 

Stark looks at him, appraising him, and sighs, "That's what I'm afraid of, Peter." 

With all of his new private tutoring with Professor Stark, Peter doesn't have the time to worry about why MJ won't speak to him anymore. 

Until he lies awake in his dorm, staring at the red canopy, every night.

* * *

Liz breaks up with him at the end of his fifth year. Auror Stark helped put her father away in Azkaban, over the summer, and Peter is too close to the older man for Liz to accept. It is too painful for her, she explains, to date someone so close to someone that was party to her father being imprisoned. He understands.  

Breaking up with Liz hurts less than he would have expected. They dated for over a year. He wonders if his feelings are dulling the older he gets. It is a worrying thought.

(His feelings have not dulled. He still feels hurt and raw when he lays awake each night thinking about the rift between MJ and him. Time has not healed whatever invisible wound exists between them. She is less of a friend than a memory now. She walks the other way when she sees him. She avoids him in classes. And Ned never talks about MJ.)

* * *

The summer before his sixth year, Ben Parker dies. No, Ben Parker is murdered. And it is all his fault. He is under seventeen, he can't use magic outside of school. His Uncle dies because Peter hesitates to draw his wand, all because the law says he can't use his powers. 

Ben Parker lies in the middle of the street, dying, and all Peter does is press his hands to his Uncle's wounds and shout for help. His wand lies dormant in his holster. 

The muggle doctors tell them they did everything they could do, and Peter clenches his jaw. He could have done more. He could have saved him. Fuck the law. His Uncle is dead. 

* * *

He floats around the castle, his sixth year, like a ghost. He is merely an imprint of the boy he used to be now. Peter Parker has been fortified in his dead Uncle's blood and this husk is all that is left. 

He barely feels Michelle's hand, when she interlocks their fingers in the corridor on the way to class. He lifts his shallow eyes and blinks. She squeezes his hand. He feels nothing. 

(He feels everything. The raw wounds that existed between them the last few years starts to stitch themselves back together.)

Peter Parker feels nothing for a long time, after Ben Parker dies. He is only a conduit for magic. The work he does with Auror Stark improves steadily. He is still a magical prodigy. It is almost easier to perform spells when he does not have a conscience to keep himself in check. 

Michelle watches him with obvious concern. Ned makes his plate at meal times. He doesn't want to be Peter Parker because Peter Parker let his Uncle die. He wants to be the Auror, the "Avenger". Perhaps that person could have saved Uncle Ben. 

He hates thinking of Aunt May all alone at 616 Queens Boulevard, while he is away at school. He lives with the memory of Ben Parker every day, but she lives with her dead husband's things-- the empty closet with his clothes, his unused favorite mug, his shoes at the door. 

One day, he collapses under the weight of it all. He falls to his knees. Michelle, who he did not even realize was at his side, catches him as he falls. She wraps her arms around him and presses her mouth to his forehead as he starts to weep. "It's all my fault," he cries. 

She clutches him tighter to her chest and rocks him back and forth, "Shh, no it isn't." 

"I could have saved him." 

"Peter--" 

He whimpers, "I killed him." 

Michelle holds him, fiercely. 

* * *

When he lets it all out, when his guts are left on the corridor floor, he starts to look to the future and not the past. He misses Ben. He blames himself for his death, but he begins to heal. Ben would not have wanted him to blame himself, he would have wanted him to live. 

He starts to wake up every day endeavoring to live a life his Uncle would have been proud of. It is not always easy.

Yet, with MJ back in his life, it is not impossible. She makes him better, he often observes whenever she challenges him to think beyond his narrow worldview. He becomes better than a conduit for magic; for power, without a conscience, is a dangerous thing. With great power, comes great responsibility. He wants to help people, not destroy. It is easy destroy things. It is much harder to endeavor to do better.

Ned is thrilled that his friends are all friends, again. In fact, he looks like he is always on the verge of bursting. It is sweet, how much he cares.

However, he and MJ being friends again only manages to hold Ned's attention for a few months because halfway through their sixth year, Betty Brant diverts all of it. The pretty Slytherin was friends with Liz Allan-Toomes, before his ex-girlfriend left school. He knew her in the way that all children knew the peers they grew up with-- peripherally. But she becomes a staple of their friend group when both Ned and Betty become partners in Herbology. 

His best friend says something truly unfunny and Betty giggles. 

Peter and MJ shared a look, that class, of surprise and amusement; and, the next thing they knew, Betty Brant was a part of their friend group. 

The way Betty and Ned slobber all of over each other borders on nauseating. It makes MJ grin, though, and so Peter endures it without much fuss. Anything to see MJ smile. 

* * *

He realizes he might be in love with MJ the first week of their seventh year when she becomes Head Girl to Brad Davis' Head Boy. They are always off together, doing Head Boy and Head Girl duties, and it really pisses Peter off. It makes him irrational and unpleasant, and Ned laughs. 

Peter scowls, "What?" 

The Hufflepuff shakes his head, "Nothing, it’s just funny, is all." 

"What's funny?" Peter demands. 

"You like MJ," Ned says, as if he is commenting on the weather. Like fact. 

Peter flounders, red as his tie, "What? No, I don't." 

Ned rolls his eyes, "Yes, you do." 

"No, I don't," Peter insists.

Betty joins them at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall and kisses Ned's cheek. "What's going on?" she asks. 

"Peter figured out he likes MJ," Ned replies.

The Slytherin sighs, "Only took him two years." She takes a long sip from her goblet. 

Peter scoffs, “Please.”

Betty raises her eyebrow, “Tell me I’m wrong.”

He finds he can’t. He scowls and flees the Great Hall. Stupid Betty and Ned don’t know what they are talking about.

* * *

He hates Brad. It is petty. It is childish. His dislike is born of his jealousy. He fails to be above his feelings for MJ. She obviously likes Brad, he thinks, and so, if he were a better friend, he would step aside and encourage her to be happy with him. Yet, every time she even mentions the Gryffindor, Peter snaps off about all of his unfavorable attributes.

The thing is—he likes Brad. He’s a cool guy. Hell, he has known Brad since he was eleven years old. They are friends, in passing, and before this term he never had a single problem with him. He was the reason Gryffindor won the Quidditch Cup the last two terms. He had toasted to him at the celebration party with the rest of their housemates.

But he likes MJ, too. Peter can tell from the soft way he looks at her, and that means that Brad is terrible.

Michelle does not think his change of attitude toward the Head Boy is at all amusing. She scowls at him more often than not these days, and when he tries to embarrass Brad in Defense Against the Dark Arts, Michelle gets furious.

After class, she tugs him into the nearest broom cupboard and frowns, “What is your deal?”

He wills himself not to be distracted by their proximity. The broom cupboard is small and her chest is flush against his own, and he can just make out the freckles that dust across her face this close.

Peter plays dumb, “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Nuh uh, yes you do.” He does not reply, so she is forced to clarify. “That childish display in Defense Against the Dark Arts, Peter. What the hell was that?”

He lowers his eyes, “That was just a bit of fun.”

She crosses her arms over her chest. It pushes them even closer in the limited closet. He is forced against the wall. “It wasn’t funny,” she says, seriously. “You’ve been crap to him all year. What is your deal?”

“He’s just so…” he fumbles. “He is just so,” he tries again. “He is just so—”

 **“So what?”** she demands.

 **“Perfect!”** he breaks. “He is just so _perfect_ , MJ. He’s the star of the Gryffindor Quidditch team. He makes great marks in school. Merlin’s Beard, he’s Head Boy. And everybody likes him so, so much.”

“So what?”

“ _You_  like him so much.”

All of the air in the broom cupboard gets suctioned out, creating a void in the little room. Michelle looks murderous. She looks upset. She looks disappointed. He would rather have her wrath than her disappointment. He can endure most things, losing Ben taught him how, but he has lived without MJ in his life. The seventh year does not want to go back to that time without her.  

He does not want to push her away. Yet, he cannot stop himself from hurting her, it seems.

“You like him so much,” he repeats. “And its so typical, you know? Like, of course you like him. Mr. Perfect. Mr. Head Boy.”

“Typical,” she repeats blankly.

Peter is on a roll. He cannot help himself from chattering, “Yes, typical. Like all the other girls that droll over him because he’s so great. And he is great! That is the most annoying bit. He’s bloody perfect.”

“You’re an ass,” she settles on, before throwing open the door to the broom cupboard and stealing away down the corridor. He is left feeling like she is absolutely right. He is an ass.

* * *

They do not talk for three weeks. It feels the longest dredge of his young life.

He tries numerous times, but Michelle pretends she cannot hear him. He probably deserves it. Ned implies he absolutely does. Betty could care less, but quietly he can tell she is Team Michelle. He is too, honestly.

He mucked everything up when his ears were filled with cotton. Jealously is not a pretty color on him. No one wears it well, but it turns Peter ugly and impolite and stupid. He wants to be better than his jealousy.

And so, he decides to do something about it.

First, he makes amends with Brad. It is awkward. He has a lot of explaining to do and, to the Head Boy’s credit, when Peter is done talking, he claps him on the shoulder and forgives him. He says, “I know what it’s like to be into MJ.” He doesn’t love that last, throwaway comment, but he bites his tongue. If he is going to do better, he needs to actually do better.

Next, he apologizes to Betty and Ned. He has not been the best friend to them. Betty waves him off because the Slytherin is willing to let things be past. Ned throws himself in Peter’s arms. The Hufflepuff squeezes his best friend and bawls, “Ugh, I missed you, man.”

Peter coughs, “I didn’t go anywhere.” Ned squishes him harder. “Ned, too tight.”

“Nuh uh,” Ned replies, “Hug it out, mate.”

He does, and Ned is right—sometimes hugging it out makes it all better.  

He suspects that logic won’t work with MJ, though. She is still avoiding him, once he has eaten enough crow with the rest of his friends. She is a master at being invisible when she wants to be. If she does not want to be seen, she is not. When he was a kid, it used to terrify him. When he was a fourth year, it used to crack him up. Now, it frustrates him.

He wants to talk to her and apologize and hold her hand and maybe kiss her a little, if she’ll let him. He can’t do any of that if she is determined to ignore him.

It takes an entire week to get her alone. He spots her in the library, bowed over a book, studying for NEWTs, and he takes his chance. He drops into the seat beside her. She tenses.

“MJ—” he starts.

She snaps her hefty book shut, “Don’t.”

He sighs, “MJ, please.”

Michelle turns her body to face him and he is momentarily wonderstruck by her face and the string of curls that fall lazily in her face. He nearly tucks those curls behind her ear, his traitorous hand itches to, but he forms his hand into a fist on his pants before he can do anything catastrophically stupid. “What do you want, Peter?” she drawls.

“I’m a git,” he answers. She squints, but stays quiet, as if asking him to elaborate. He exhales, “I’m a stupid prick. I should have stayed out of your thing with Brad. I should have been a better friend and supported you. And I shouldn’t have said all that crap in the broom cupboard. I was upset and wrong.”

She draws her wand and he gulps. She is going to hex him. He deserves it. And she is going to hex him.

Instead, she banishes the books that are strewn on the library table. They float back toward the proper stacks they came from.

“I don’t like Brad,” she finally says when all the books are gone. “I mean, I like Brad. He’s a nice guy. He’s my friend. But I don’t like him like that, Peter.”

Confusion dashes across his features like one of those modern, muggle paintings. It is messy and colorful and strangely hopeful. “You don’t?”

“No, of course not,” she grumbles. “I like you, you numpty. I’ve liked you for ages.”

“Wait,” he blinks, ridden with disbelief. “Wait. I don’t understand.”

Michelle lets out a long-suffering sigh. He feels in his bones how exhausting he must be to his friends. It almost makes him smile, but he is too dumbstruck by her admission to manage one. “I’ve liked you since fourth year, Peter, way before Liz Allan-Toomes ever looked in your direction.”

He puts some things together rapidly, like a jolt of magic. “Wait, is that why you stopped talking to me, back then?”

She has the decency to look embarrassed, “It was weird for me, okay? I didn’t know how to handle it.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Of course not,” she says.

Something significant occurs to Peter. He inches closer to MJ and draws a straight line between two thoughts, “Then, why did you get so mad at me about the Brad stuff? You don’t handle your jealousy well, either, you know.” They were one-in-the-same. Both crap at handling liking the other. Jealousy was not pretty on either of them. Peter starts to feel the prickling of upset with her, the more he thinks about how she spent the last weeks shutting him out, when he notices her face slides completely slack. “MJ?” he prompts, worriedly.

Her expression shifts into something sweet and scared and cautiously hopeful. Something significant goes boom in his chest. She tucks that curl, the one that tortures the impulse in his hand to reach out for it, behind her ear and whispers, “You like me?”

Peter startles. He stops. And thinks—has he not said that out loud yet? Does she not know? Gently, he says, “Oh,  _Em_.” He scoots his chair across the wooden floor so their knees are touching. “Of course I do.”

“Oh,” she squeaks. Her eyes dart to the ground, “Okay.”

He lifts her chin, so their eyes meet, and smiles, “Okay?”

She rolls her eyes but it is a gesture that is too embarrassed yet pleased to hold any real bite. “Yes,” she replies, “O. K.”

“I like you,” he repeats. “In case that wasn’t explicitly clear.”

MJ nervously laughs, “Yeah, I got that.”

He curves his hand across her cheek and takes hold of the back of her head, drawing them close, “Just checking.” When they kiss for the first time, it is soft and exploratory. It is riddled with disbelief and caution. Neither of them want to screw this up. As far as Peter is concerned, this is it. She is  _the_  girl.   

“Peter,” she whispers against his mouth.

“Hmm?” he hums.

“Stop thinking so much.”

For the first time in the last seven years, he turns off his brain and kisses her properly.

* * *

Graduation is weird. He does not know what he is going to do without Hogwarts. The last seven years he has spent nearly every day, save the summers, in these halls. His entire formative life has been contained at Hogwarts. He made his first friend here. He had his first kiss near the lake. He learned how to use magic inside these four walls. He fell in love at Hogwarts. It is home.

Michelle slides her hand into his and he suddenly doesn’t feel so afraid.

He is going to be alright.

Peter looks at MJ.

In fact, he is going to be just fine.


End file.
